Our Team

The Ontario Digital Literacy and Access Network is a community-based pilot initiative founded by 2S-LGBTQ+ graduate students, community members, and allies who are concerned with the digital divide in our communities. We are passionate about connecting organizations and individuals with resources and services that will minimizing digital inequalities in 2S-LGBTQ+ communities.

Our Team Members

Stephanie Jonsson

Founder

(She/Her)

Stephanie is a PhD. Candidate in the School of Gender, Feminist and Women Studies at York University. She is an active member of the Senior Pride Network and Rainbow Faith and Freedom. Stephanie co-founded ODLAN after conducting a study on the barriers 2S-LGBTQ+ older adults were experiencing in accessing remote service provisions during the global pandemic.

Hannah Maitland

Co-Founder

(She/Her)

Hannah is a PhD. Candidate in the School of Gender, Feminist and Women Studies at York University. She helped to co-founded ODLAN in 2020. Hannah is a girls’ studies scholar who studies girl activists and their family relationships.

Angela Stanley

Accessibility Coordinator

(She/Her)

Angela Stanley (MA 2014; PhD Candidate, Gender, Feminist and Women’s Studies, York University) completed a Masters in Critical Disability Studies at York University, writing a major research paper on Disability and Sexuality: Perceptions of Beauty, Sexuality and Desirability for Queer, Disabled Youth. Angela continues her studies pursuing a doctoral degree in the Gender, Feminist and Women’s Studies Program at York University. Her research pays attention to the intersection of race/culture, queerness and disability in order to understand how people make sense of their intimate and sexual lives. Her work so far has centered on the perceptions of beauty, sexuality and desirability that inform how young queer and disabled people create intimate and/ or sexual partnerships.

Alexandra Latter

Communications Consultant

(She/Her)

Alexandra Latter is an Honours graduate of the York University Sexuality Studies BA program, as well as the Gender & Women’s Studies certificate program. She has volunteered for a number of different organizations including the Senior’s Pride Network, the Sexual Assault Support Line & Leadership Group, Victims Services Toronto, and more. Currently, Alex applies her skills in tech and communication as an Enterprise Account Manager at OnCall Health, a video conferencing and practice management platform for healthcare workers across Canada and the United States.

Viktor Zhuang

Digital Guide

(He/Him)

Viktor Zhuang is a recent graduate from the Department of Computer Science at University of Toronto. He is passionate about advocating for diversity and accessibility within the tech field. He has experience volunteering with 2S-LBGTQ+ student communities and both academic and work experience in web design and programming. At ODLAN he designs and creates graphical content to provide resources on digital literacy and access for 2S-LBGTQ+ organizations.

Isabella Fiore

Accessibility Coordinator

(She/They)

Isabella Fiore is an undergraduate student at the University of Ottawa student studying Political Science and Feminist/Gender Studies. She is passionate about increasing accessibility for 2S-LGBTQ+ individuals and the disability justice movement. They have worked with a variety of non-profits and student associations throughout her high school and university careers in order to bring equity issues to the table.

AV Verhaeghe

Project Coordinator

(They/Them)

AV Verhaeghe recently completed their PhD in Gender, Feminist, & Women’s Studies at York University. Their dissertation focused on the intersections of racism and homophobia in Canadian history. Outside of their academic work, AV has been involved in 2SLGBTQ+ community work in Toronto and Hamilton for the past ten years, including running youth drop in programs, planning events, and developing programs and policies.  

Aidan Smith

IT specialist

(He/Him)

Aidan is an IT Specialist/Consultant. He studied in the Computer and Network Support Technician program at Humber College. Aidan has honed his IT skills while working in a help desk role over the last four years, transitioning into a consultant/security role. Aidan takes pleasure in using his IT Skills to help remove digital literacy and access barriers impacting 2S-LGBTQ+ communities.  

Helen Martin

Media Officer

(She/Her)

Helen Martin is a 4th year student in York University’s sexuality studies major. She is passionate about sexual and reproductive health for women and 2SLGBTQ+ folks. She hopes to continue her studies at the masters level next year. Helen has worked and volunteered at a variety of grassroots and non-profit charities and hopes to continue this work in the future.

Hanna Jalal

Co-Volunteer Coordinator

(She/Her)

Hanna Jalal is a 4th-year student at York University studying Gender and Women’s Studies/History. She is passionate about issues of accessibility and the development of creative feminist-grounded solutions to said barriers. A people-person, at ODLAN she works with volunteers, providing the necessary support and guidance for those who are also passionate about 2SLGBTQ+ rights and looking to get involved.

Sarah Westerhof

Team Member

(She/Her)

Sarah is an educator and PhD. student in the Gender, Feminist and Women’s Studies department at York University. Their work interrogates the organization of online surveillance while exploring possibilities for its refusal and resistance.

Christopher Dietzel

Community Research Advisor

(He/Him)

Christopher is a research associate at McGill University, postdoctoral fellow at Dalhousie Univeristy, and visiting scholar at York University. Christopher’s research explores the intersections of gender, sexuality, health, safety, and technology, and he received his PhD in 2021 for his work on queer people’s experiences with dating apps. With ODLAN, Christopher facilitates workshops and provides support on community-based research projects.

Our Board Members

Stephen Low

Chair

Stephen Low is currently Manager of Operations at Rainbow Faith and Freedom. Before joining the Not-for-Profit sector, he received his PhD from Cornell University in April 2016, where he also received his Masters in Theater Studies in 2014. He received his first Masters from the University of Texas at Austin in the Performance as Public Practice Program in 2011. His academic research focuses on queer theory, sex and sexuality, gender, race, cultural studies, and gay culture. In addition to his scholarship, Stephen has taught in the Department of Gender and Women’s Studies at Trent University. His current book project, Hail Mary: The Theatricality Constitution of Gay Culture, identifies theatricality as the constitutive feature of contemporary gay culture. His essays have been published in Modern Drama, Theatre Research in Canada, Canadian Theatre Review, Queer Theatre in Canada. Critical Perspectives in Canadian Theatre in English Series, Opera Canada, and Intermission.

Jennifer Silk

Co-Chair

Jennifer is highly passionate about working in program development, capacity building, and community engagement. She has 20 years of experience in the non-profit sector. Jennifer loves connecting with people, building relationships, and collaborating. Rainbow Spaces is a program she launched in 2019, and it has since grown into a strong, well-known program amongst 2SLGBTQ+ communities in York Region. Jennifer is a strategic thinker, always planning ahead. She looks forward to helping ODLAN achieve its mission to create digital strategies for 2SLGBTQ+ communities across Canada. 

Vivian Lee

Board Member

Vivian Lee is a digital literacy and technology education specialist, with 10 years of experience in education management, curriculum design, and course architecture in the private, public, and non-profit sectors.

By day, she is an e-learning program development specialist, designing tech curriculum and educational policy for K-12 school boards, post-secondary institutions, and private independent schools. Her favourite topics in education are predictive policy modeling, digital citizenship, artificial intelligence systems, and next generation cybersecurity strategies.

By night, she is an academic researcher who is working through her doctorate in curriculum policy for provincial and governmental institutions. Her thesis work and publications center EdTech futures, STEM for multilingual learners, digital citizenship curriculum policy, digital access issues, intersectional education frameworks, and next-gen media literacies.

leZlie lee kam

Board Member

I am a world majority, Brown, trini, Carib, Indo, Chinese, callaloo, differently-abled, queer DYKE, community activist, Elder. 

I am a 2S-LGBTQI+ awareness consultant and workshop facilitator. I focus on the issues affecting 2S-LGBTQI+ seniors / older adults and the barriers we are forced to overcome on a daily basis. I share my lived experiences of queerness, age, race, ability and sexuality with openness and vulnerability. I live and work from an anti-oppression, anti-racism, anti-colonial, intergenerational and intersectional perspective.

Ashley Di Benedetto

Board Member

Ashley Di Benedetto (she/her/hers). A resident of North Bay, ON and a pansexual, cis-gendered woman with a passion to advocate for client rights, accessible programming and the creation of safe spaces for al people within the 2S-LGBTQ+ and BIPOC communities. Ashley is the Program Coordinator for the New Horizons for 2S-LGBTQ+ Older Adults program and has been working alongside ODLAN since its fruition. Ashley has over 15 years experience in social services and prides herself on the prioritization of a person-centered approach to care. She is fiercely dedicated to expanding the accessibility, availability and inclusivity of services in the North to improve the social, physical and mental determinants of health for all people. 

Christopher Bennett

Board Secretary

Christopher is a 6th-year PhD candidate in the Department of Gender Studies at Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario. Their current work focuses on the intersections of social justice activism and Lacanian Psychoanalysis with a specific focus on trans-cultural production. They’ve also completed a BAH in Health Studies and MA in Gender Studies during their time at Queen’s, with focuses on campus safety for LGBTQ+ undergraduates and representations of trauma in social justice movements, respectively. They look forward to bringing their analytic lens to thinking through the impact of continued digitization on how LGBTQ+ folks interact with each other.